IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Cathay and the Way Thither : vol.2 |
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Citation Information
BY JOHN DE' MARIGNOLLI. 371
if they did they would stink so that nobody could endure them. They seldom show themselves, but yet they are given to trade. Their wives and children, as frightful goblins as themselves, they carry about upon donkeys.' Yet St. Augustine and the mass of theologians deem it absurd to suppose that any should have escaped the Deluge unless in the ark... .
.... And the ark grounded in the seventh month on a mountain of Armenia, which is near the Iron Gates in the Empire of Uzbek, and is called Ararat in the Lesser Armenia.
Next we come to the Second Age, and the beginning of the Second Book which is called Monarclws.
From the first chapter, which treats Of the Distribution of the Earth among the Sons of Noah, I extract some passages :
Noah therefore under the command of God delivered instructions to his sons about maintaining divine service in the worship of the One God by sacrifices, about the multiplication of offspring, and the division of the earth, that they might replenish it, and live in peace after his death. And he desiring a quiet life for his remaining days, reserved for himself the Isle of Cethym [Chittim] now called Cyprus."' Shem the firstborn, as king and priest after his father, obtained half of the world, i.e., all Asia the Great, extending from the White Sea beyond Hungary, where now are the Wallachians,3
1 Here he speaks of the Vecldahs, or Aborigines of Ceylon. Compare Tennent's description : " Miserable objects, active but timid, and athletic though deformed, with large heads and misshapen limbs. Their long black hair and beards fell down to the middle in uncombed lumps, they stood with their faces bent towards the ground, and their restless eyes twinkled upwards with an expression of uneasiness and apprehension.... The children were unsightly objects, entirely naked, with misshapen joints, huge heads and protuberant stomachs ; the women, who were reluctant to appear, were the most repulsive specimens of humanity I have ever seen in any country" (ii, 450).
2 Where, says Marignolli in another passage, " he planted a vineyard, which belongs at this day to the Archbishop of Nicosia. (Dobner, p. 109.)
3 " Olachi." But what White Sea is meant, that lies beyond Hungary
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